The subject matter herein relates generally to press devices configured to form work pieces.
Work pieces, such as electrical terminals, are prevalent in electrical devices and applications. The electrical terminals are coupled to a conductive wire or cable, such as by a crimping process, to form electrical leads used to provide an electrical signal path between two electrical components in the same or different electrical devices. Some known electrical terminals are produced by stamping and forming sheet metal in a series of production steps using one or more mechanical presses. For example, a flat blank of sheet metal may be cut into a specific flat shape and then formed by bending the cut shape into a curved or at least non-flat geometry. Some known female terminals are formed to define a cavity that receives a blade of a corresponding male terminal therein. The formed female terminals must meet strict standards to ensure that, for example, the cavity is large enough to receive the blade, while also small enough that the female terminal engages the blade and applies a force on the blade to retain the blade in the cavity without damaging the blade. Due to terminals having varying thicknesses and widths, the mechanical presses that form the terminals often require fine adjustments in order to produce terminals that meet the exacting standards.
In some known presses, a die includes a punch that is held in a punch holder and a base. The punch and the punch holder move relative to the base to form terminals located on the base. In order to adjust parameters such as a height of the punch relative to the base, which affects an amount of bend applied to the terminals, some known presses require an operator to disassemble the die. For example, the operator may need to remove the die from the press, remove the punch from the punch holder, add shims to or remove shims from the top of the punch, reassemble the die, and then re-insert the die into the press. In addition to investing a considerable amount of time and effort in the adjustment, there is no way to immediately verify whether the adjustment is successful until the press is operational again. Thus, the operator may need to re-adjust the press multiple times in a trial and error fashion until the parameters are correct, each time requiring another disassembly and reassembly process. A need remains for easy and efficient in-press adjustment of the punch in the press that allows for accurate fine tuning of the punch.